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POEMS 



Published by the Author as a Birthday Gift 



Printed by 

The Brandow^ Printing Company 

Albany, N. Y. 






Copyright. 1911, 
By'iThe Brandow Printing Company 



©CI.A295137 



4 

^ TO MY MOTHER 

Beside the sea, the dear old sea. 
We roam together on the shore; 

And hy that annual sign I knorv 

Thy birthday season's here once more. 
My mother. 

Dost see the ship make for the bay. 
The waves roll on, the surf so high? 

That ship is life, those waves are years 
That whiten as the coast draws nigh, 
mother. 

Dost mark yon wide, wide sweep of blue — 
Yon beauteous, boundless soul of blue? 

Methinks thou art that soul, and I 
That ship borne on thy bosom true. 
Dear mother. 

fast the birthday seasons fly. 

All, all too fast the years are spent; 
But still we better know and love. 

And, loving more, are more content. 
Sweet mother. 



Though, like the pebble at our feet. 

Our hearts are ground each year more true. 

Yet, as the frail sea grasses, they 
Each year their tenderness renerv. 
My mother. 

*Tis growth of love then year by year 
Makes this, thy birthday, dear to me; 

And bids my yearning soul to speak 
In rvords I dedicate to thee. 
My mother. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Dedication — To My Mother 3 

The Elfin Apprentice 7 

The Call of the Ocean 9 

By the Sea at Arundel 11 

Lines to the Unadilla River 13 

To the Chicory 16 

The Old-Time Nook 18 

In Every Soul There Burns a Light — 

A Hymn 26 

A Hymn of Ascription and Prayer. ... 27 

Life's Ecstasies 28 

The Yearning Heart 29 

Truth— A Sonnet 31 

The Engineer — A Sonnet 32 

The Call to Battle S3 



I 



THE ELFIN APPRENTICE 

KNOW a saucy little waif; 
Of ttimes I like him much — ah^ much ! 
He's bounden to me^ but he's safe 

From my rebuke of voice or touch. 
Some folks don't see how I can bide 

This slippery^ skippery goblin elf; 
They tell me (bless 'em) I'm beside 
Myself. 

Truth is, I'm bound to him by Fate, 
Just as he's bound to me — ah me ! 

And though ('tis shame to own) I hate 
Betimes his impish mockery, 

And dodge his conscience-smiting darts, 
And war as Ghibelline with Guelf, 

I can't escape him till he parts 
Himself. 



8 The Elfin Apprentice 

Sometimes he's bonny company 

And heartens me with j oy — ah^ j oy ! 

But laugh I cannot more than he. 
My own ubiquitous elfin boy. 

Anon, what taciturnity ! 

What grin of malice, greed of pelf! 

Would I were spared his company. 
Myself ! 

And yet a churchly story says, 

Sometime (I kind o' hope — ay hope 

'Tis so), when his apprentice days 
Die out in freer, grander scope. 

He'll fling his ribald mask to rot 

And molder on yon gruesome shelf; 

And lo ! what once he seemed, was not 
Himself. 

And, though his pranks and cunning quirks 
I know full well are true — too true, 

I know also that in him lurks 
My only hope to be or do. 

Ah ! lest he hear, you whisper soft, 
"Who is this greedy, mocking elf?" 

His name — you've heard it oft and oft — 
Is Self. 



p 



The Call of the Ocean 9 



THE CALL OF THE OCEAN 

NTO the skies blushing in bridal grace, 
Unto the isles smiling in his embrace. 
The Ocean calls. 



Untamed as when he stirred Odysseus 
To storied quest, with hoary lips, to us 
Old Ocean calls. 

Sweet-tongued, from weltering reaches 

flecked with rime. 
Rough-mouthed where the bold ridges chafe 

and climb. 

The Ocean calls. 

Beneath the heavings of his breast, I trow. 
His soul to my soul speaks, and drowns its 
woe. 

When Ocean calls. 

Now tossing tunefully the silver spray. 
His great heart beating some wild lyric lay, 
The Ocean calls. 

Fain would I fling me on his billowy breast. 
To rock forever there in " sweet unrest," 
When thus he calls. 



10 The Call of the Ocean 

Anon^ the Titan's snowy limbs arise — 
Weary of beating earthy attack the skies; 
Loud Ocean calls ! 

Now I would hie me hence in wild alarm; 
Yet powerless I to break the wizard charm, 
When Ocean calls. 

The snarling rage, the din, the rant are o'er; 
The plaintive plashing on the piteous shore 
Siren-like calls. 

Articulate through endless change and rude, 
The changeless soul, the blue infinitude 
Of Ocean calls. 

Oft as on brineless, inland seas I roam. 
The carrier winds cry unto me, " Come home, 
Thee Ocean calls." 

And when to my last sleep I'll lay me low, 
Faint, far-off murmurs still shall bid me go 
Where Ocean calls. 



By the Sea at Arundel 11 

BY THE SEA AT ARUNDEL* 

Tune, "The Star- Spangled Banner." 

I 

<7TTRA la, tra la la, not an insect or bird 
^^ Ever winged lighter measures in 

frolics or dances ; 
Not the sweetest of music that mortal has 
heard 
Ever lures us away from the home of our 
fancies. 

Let the waves rock and roll. 
Let the sea-demons bowl 
In the surf that seems stirred by some ocean- 
born soul. 

So here's to Arundel, 
A town by the sea 
That's a boon to the careworn, 
A balm to the free! 

II 

O say, shall we glide o'er the shoal and the 
deep 
In the white-pinioned craft or the oar- 
winged cradles 

*Arundel is the old name applied to the locality of 
Kennebunk, Maine, including Cape Porpoise which the 
writer had in mind. 



12 By the Sea at Arundel 

Shall we toss on the sea ere the fickle tides 
sweep 
And bail it half out with unseen brooms 
and ladles? 

Shall we drink from thy stein^ 
Shall we lave in thy brine, 
O thou spirit of ocean, what raptures are 
thine ! 

Long live old Arundel, 
That town by the sea, 
'Tis a refuge, a haven, 
A balm to the free ! 

/// 

O jubilant tide of perpetual glee. 

Ever laughing and sparkling and surging 
and voicing 
The desires of our hearts, careless, weltering 
sea. 
We are caught in the depths of thy bound- 
less rejoicing. 

Like sea nymphs we play 
In the glistening spray, 
Till the cares of life beckon and steal us 
away. 

Then long live Arundel, 
And long may it be 
A boon to the careworn, 
A balm to the free ! 



Lines to the Unadilla River IS 

LINES TO THE UNADILLA RIVER 

WRITTEN AUGUST 1905 

/jQ THOU gentle Unadilla, 
^^ Thou art not a maddened stream — 
One whose rock-entangled waters. 
Phantom-chasing, shoot and scream. 

Thou art not a lordly river. 
Bearing ships upon thy breast; 

Yet I love thee, thou that ever 
Murmurest of peace and rest. 

By thy margin oft I linger. 
Hidden from the noonday glare, 

That with iridescent beauty 
Smiles upon thy bosom fair. 

Like a maiden, chaste and holy. 
Gliding among leafy bowers. 

Thou dost mirror in thy being 
All the sweetness of the flowers. 

Like a lover thou dost cherish 

Dipping winds and meadows calm; 

Lavest them with cool caresses; 
Feedest them with healing balm. 



1^ Lines to the Unadilla River 

And thy dreamy, gurgling music 
Ceases not the livelong day. 

Nor when o'er thy shrouded waters 
Carnivals of moonbeams play. 

O beloved Unadilla! 

In thy cloistered raiment dressed — 
Thou that art forever blessing, 

And forever shalt be blest — 

With a bold display of beauty 
Nature did not thee endow, 

Yet, methinks, the Queen of rivers 
Could not fairer be than thou. 

WRITTEN AFTER THE FLOOD OF 
SEPTEMBER 4, 1905 

^ARK to the roaring! 

What is the seething; 
Whence the dull breathing 

That deafens the ear? 
Is it the whirlwind? 
Is it the storm-king. 
Who rides in the lightning 

Lonely and drear? 
Nay, 'tis the river, the loved Unadilla, 

Whose waters I hear. 



Lines to the Unadilla River 15 

Foaming and booming 
And raging and tearing, 
With fury unsparing. 

And freighted with spoil. 
Flooding the lowlands 
And creeping and leaping 
And ruthlessly reaping 

The fruitage of toil. 
Dire are the waters, the angry waters 

That ravage the soil. 

O treacherous river. 

Once pleading and wooing. 

Naively enduing 

With beauty and bloom — 
Now, false-hearted lover. 
While yet all is sleeping. 
Bounding, and sweeping 

It down to its doom. 
Ay, so are thy waters the type of man's 
passions 

That flash in the gloom. 



16 To the Chicory 



TO THE CHICORY 

^[ KEN no more the mystic rote 

^ Of woodlands ringings ringing. 

The thrush's note, the yellowthroat. 

The singing, singing, singing. 
I, like the Prisoner of Chillon, 

Am in my dungeon weeping; 
For woods are gone and flowers — save one 
That watch is keeping. 

The city smoke my prison drapes. 
Shrill shrieks the whistle, whistle; 

The clatter scrapes o'er murky shapes 
That bristle, bristle, bristle ! 

But suddenly my heart is freed. 
My captive sight discloses 

Thee, little weed, that seem'st indeed. 
Sweetest of posies. 



My prison doors thou op'nest wide. 
And through them stealing, stealing. 

The joyous tide of countryside 
Comes pealing, pealing, pealing. 



To the Chicory 17 

I see thy blue-eyed blossom there, 

By the old path or in it. 
And all is fair — all everywhere, 
And every minute. 

A hundred dewy eyes I see, 
Wherewith thou wooest, wooest 

The honey-bee that prays to thee. 
His bluest, bluest, bluest ! 

And true thou art as blue thou art, 
For in ways stark and awesome. 

Thou dost impart cheer to my heart. 
My bonny blossom. 

Wee sailor, fast to thy green mast. 

Or bird, a-flitter, flitter. 
In frock of blue, with eyes of dew. 

That glitter, glitter, glitter ! 
With thee, my Brave, by rills and streams 

Where wold and wildwood glisten, 
I shoot sunbeams and catch lost dreams. 
And look and listen. 

What though the vision melts away. 
And leaves me thinking, blinking 



18 The Old-Time Nook 

At walls of gray and grim decay^ 
And noises clinking, clinking, 

Sweet Conjurer, the charm's with thee 
To spell my prison trappings ; 

Thou hast the key, and guardest me — 
Betwixt thy nappings. 

And when her lullaby the Night 
Hums to thee, " Lie low, lie low," 

Thy lids closed tight^ then I'll, in flight. 
Sing " Heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho ! " 

Ah nay! Thy ruse I guessed not. Fair — 
That when thy blossom doses. 

Its chaliced lair, so debonair, 
My heart encloses. 



THE OLD-TIME NOOK 

/jQLD Nora was the nurse, and with her 
^-^ charge. 

Sweet Marion — scarce open-eyed as yet 
To this new world — she labored forth each 

morn 
And in the great wide park, past avenues 
Of palms and statues and through stately 

walks 



The Old-Time Nook 19 

She hurried to her favored nook, spread out 
The pied shawl on the greenery, and there — 
The breezes blowing sunshine over her. 
The blossoms shedding perfume upon her. 
The robins friendly, squirrels curious — 
Prattling and toddling, cooing, crying too. 
Sweet Marion grew into maidenhood. 

And often she would stray from Nora now. 
And wander to the nook she loved, alone. 
And wonder, as she sat embowered there. 
Why " mother " was a name forbidden her. 
The yearning came upon her ere she knew — • 
And grew apace — to feel the mother-love 
Drawing her closer to the mother's breast; 
And when, a-down the vistas of the park 
The maiden's gaze, descending, fell on scenes 
Of merry family groups, strange loneliness 
Beset her soul and melted it in tears. 

So Marion grew on, but Nora died — 
Dear Nora who had labored long and well — 
Yet still the nook was there and Marion, 
Saddened at first, but stately grown and fair. 
And taking now her place with rank and 
wealth. 



20 The Old-Time Nook 

Still sought the quiet bench, the grassy 

bower. 
And a sweet respite from life's thralldom 

there. 
Alas ! Some stranger's steps had followed 

hers. 
And seemed to desecrate that hallowed spot; 
For often Marion found a woman spent, 
A woman wan and of the poorer class 
Within the nook, and once, roused from some 

dream. 
The maiden started to behold that face. 
Those piercing eyes upon her, and it seemed, 
A very heart-burn in the fixed look. 
And hardly had the woman craved to sit 
Near by, ere Marion, moved alike by shock 
At the intrusion and by loathing too 
For meanness in that spot, cast but a glance. 
One haughty, scathing glance at her and fled. 
Swiftly she fled, but something from within 
Impelled her to look back. O piteous 

Heaven ! 
The instant picture of that woman there — 
Fall'n on her knees, her hands above her 

clasped. 
Her face — unmeasured depths of agony. 



The Old-Time Nook 21 

Quickly the maiden turned with heavy heart 
And slackened pace to wend her homeward 
way. 

Years came and went, and one had often sat 
With Marion in that sequestered nook. 
Together they had watched the arching elms. 
The faces quaintly carved upon the birch; 
Seen the gay throngs and gayer garden plots 
Through the embroidered windows of the 

trees. 
For them the world was fair and sadness e'en 
Unthinkable. His troth was plighted there. 
For in the maiden's heart he filled the need, 
The crying need of mother, brother — twain 
In one, and her robust and girlhood love 
She poured into his cup till it o'erflowed. 

Years came and went. His love was wear- 
ing out — 

His love, her all whose own could never die. 

Once a sweet infant life kindled new hope; 

But earth snuffed out that heaven-lit altar 
flame; 

Faith sank, tears came and the changed 
years wore on. 



22 The Old-Time Nook 

He went his way, and now once more her 

steps_, 
Faltering through the merry throng and 

down 
The palm-lined avenue, unconsciously 
Traced half forgotten paths, and now again 
Sweet Marion sat in the old-time nook. 
Alone, and mused, until a falling leaf 
(Or haply 'twas some thought of bygone 

days) 
Kissed back the blush of youth into her 

cheek 
That, fading, seemed more pallid than be- 
fore ; — 
As the first touch of Autumn reddens all 
The woodland and then strips it bleak and 

bare; 
And Marion lifted her eyes toward heaven, 
And then they wandered to the scenes of 

yore — 
The selfsame elms against the selfsame sky. 
The selfsame vistas with the garden plots. 
And mothers (O the pain in that word 

, now!) 
Tending their little ones, and nearer by 
The berry clusters hanging overhead. 



The Old-Time Nook 23 

Amid the fading foliage of the bower 
That sheltered her and veiled from view till 

now 
A stranger's presence. She was not alone! 
For sitting there an aged woman moaned_, 
A withered form wrapped in the threadbare 

weeds 
Of poverty — a sight so commonplace 
One seeing, sees it not, or turns away 
To bury the uncanny memory 
'Neath scenes of beauty, thoughts of finer 

things. 
But O 'tis grief that makes for brotherhood ! 
'Tis sorrow only that can understand 
A kindred sorrow; and to him who drinks 
That cup, new sight is given, new worlds 

are born; 
And Marion, whose heart o'erflowed with 

love 
And pity for the woman, rose and sat 
Beside her, looked into her eyes a look 
All love and pity, and the answering 

glance — 
Could one but gather all the sorrow in 
From a long life of pain, and then transform 



^^ The Old-Time Nook 

That sorrow into joy, 'twould only half 
Express the light in her transfigured face. 
But Marion — why was her arm withdrawn. 
Her pallor deepened? Why that quick re- 
coil ? 
Was there, perchance, some dim resemblance 

still 
Betwixt this sainted woman and that face 
Whose lines of agony had haunted her 
Since the first meeting here so long ago — 
Ay, since that cruel look of long ago? 
Or did the face as she beheld it now 
Touch chords more tender yet, and somehow 

match 
The lines etched deeply on her memory 
From an old miniature that one had said, 
In whispered tones, as from its hiding-place 
He drew it forth, was her own mother's 

face? 
Hist! to the sound of sobbing in the bower. 
The intertwining of the arms, the glow 
As of two hearts, warm rushing into one; 
For Marion saw and knew at last, I ween. 
This mother-outcast who had followed her 
Within the range of touch and sight and 
breath. 



The Id-Time Nook 25 

Yet e'en as separate as if she dwelt 
In spirit mold instead of mortal flesh — - 
The twain as widely cleft as when a gulf 
Impenetrable yawns twixt two who wait 
On the opposing shores, and wait and yearn. 
Ay, and the maiden yearned, but still the 

core 
Of haughtiness within her kept the gulf 
Between; till now the woman's love and 

tears — 
A sorrow-chastened love, cleansed of its 

pride — 
Burst through that gulf and now for the 

first time. 
Here among falling leaves and ripened fruit. 
Here in the ebbing autumn-tide of life. 
Sweet Marion learned to know the mother- 
love 
Drawing her closer to the mother's breast. 



26 A Hymn 

A HYMN 

Tune, " Serenity." 

Hff N every soul there burns a light 
^ To faith and love akin; 
Yet there's no love that shines so bright 
But sorrow enters in — 

Sorrow that rends our joys and hopes 
And flings them back amain. 

Grief that with Faith and Virtue copes 
The mastery to gain. 

O Father^ from within, above, 

Make Thou our faith to be 
The weapon that turns grief to love. 

Defeat to victory. 

Then shall the old world disappear — 

Transfigured every clod ! 
Then shall the soul by ever tear 

Draw nearer unto God. 



A Hymn of Ascription and Prayer 27 



A HYMN OF ASCRIPTION AND PRAYER 

/J^ Lover of creation, 
^^ Whom all the spheres obey, 

The sun of Thy salvation 
Turns darkness into day. 

Thy beauty is too ample 

For mortal eyes to see. 
Save in the fine example 

Of Nature's mimicry. 

Thy love is like the mountains 

That girdle earth around 
And spill their copious fountains 

To heal the thirsty ground. 

Thy hand that hews the hilltops 
And paints the varied plain. 

Thy mercies on us still drops; 
Thou'rt sweeter than the rain! 

From past the bounds of sorrow, 
Through the windowed walls of light. 

Thy vision of the morrow 
Illuminates our night. 



28 Life's Ecstacies 

Thy joy the spirit leavens; 

Thy bounties never cease; 
Thy glory fills the heavens — 

O give the world Thy peace ! 

life's ecstacies 

(TTTti'E morning tiptoes up the hill, 
^^ And bursts in glory o'er the crest; 
Be still, my fiut'ring heart, be still, 
Thou art not ripe to flee thy nest. 
Sing merrily, sing cheerily. 
The world's before thee. Love ! 
Sing happy, happy, happy. 
To the dancing, the entrancing. 
To the airy tune, in June, 
Of fairy wings 
Above. 

And so Life tiptoes up the hill, 

To burst in glory o'er the crest; 

But then — ah me ! the heart is still, 

And flown forever from its nest. 

Sing wearily, sing drearily. 

My Love from me has fled ! 

Toll sorrow, sorrow, sorrow. 



The Yearning: Heart 



o 



To the droning^ groaning, moaning- 
For with every sigh, I die, 
To whom the world 
Is dead. 



THE YEARNING HEART 



^IJjjTY heart's a star that's lured away 
^^lll- From its cradle in the sky. 
Pleads the nursling star 
With the mother sky: 
" O take me back to the haunts on high, 
Where the astral flocks twinkle at play. 
In the infinite fields where life is free — 

For the world is quenching me day by day, 
And I fainter shine in my agony, 
And I flicker and gasp 
In the cruel clasp 
Of Death, yet dare not die." 

Calls the mother sky to the nursling star: 
" Wondrous afar 
Thy shining is. Shine on ! " 



30 The Yearning Heart 

II 

My heart's a bird that's fallen sheer 
From its nest on the mountain crag. 
Cries the fledgling bird 
To the mother crag: 
" O bear me hence from this slime and slag 
To my home in the wild free atmosphere; 
For my pinions are spread and I catch the 
breeze^ 
But these fleshly things, with carnal jeer — 
Earth's slag and slime — stifle and freeze. 
And ere I can rise 
To glimpse the skies, 
My wings to Earth they drag.'* 

Calls the mother crag to the fledgling bird: 
" Be not deterred, 
Grow strong by struggling on!" 

Ill 

My heart's a soul asunder cleft 
From the bosom soul of God. 
Prays that weary soul 
To the Grace of God: 
" O lift me out of the depths I've trod, 

And into Thy glory, sin-bereft. 
And into Thy soul for aye and aye; 
And out of myself, for in it left. 



Two Sonnets SI 

I grope and cringe and living die — 
To gods of soil 
By craven toil 
Fettered and sacrificed." 

Speaks the risen Christ to my weary soul: 
" The blessed goal 
Is nearing. Follow on ! " 



TWO SONNETS 

/. Truth 

(TTfVLOU golden vessel filled with crystal 

Vi> light. 

That from thy poise on the eternal wings 
Filterest down to us stray flickerings 

To plow the fallow darkness of the night, 

Till from the seeds of spiritual sight 

Desire, recast in Beauty's mold, upsprings. 
Through bursting prison walls Life sees 
and sings, 

And man with man is set in tune aright! 

Thou purer Grail, spilling thy charity 

O'er humankind, yet borne above the 
stress 



S2 Two Sennets 

And solvent whirl of the world's ribaldry! 
E'en from those crystal depths and 

fathomless 
Pour thou thy light, whose glory shall 
impress 
Our steps, eternal Truth, toward God and 
thee. 

II. The Engineer 

<^rHOU silent, sturdy man of brawn and 
^^ brain. 

Careful in venture, swift to execute — 
Thy subtle hand on Nature's pulse; thy 

foot 
On the neck of Nature's wastefulness ! In 
vain 
She writhes and vomits fire and belches 
rain — 
For her own better self is thy recruit. 
Teaching the law that makes and unmakes 

brute. 
Giving thee power, whose power is the 
world's gain, 
O builder, finisher of poets' dreams ! 

Physician, quencher of the Nation's thirst ! 
Lover of truth and scorner of pretense. 



The Call to Battle— The Battle of Life 33 

Proud of coarse toil ennobled by high 

themes ! 
Warrior, thy glory 'tis to be the first 
To dethrone War and enthrone Common 

Sense. 



THE CALL TO BATTLE THE BATTLE OF LIFE 



LOW! blow o'er hill and plain 
Far-resounding bugle-cries ! 
Roll, drums, your martial strain, 
"Awake! arise! " 



Souls lit with patriot fires. 

Flaming volleys rend the calms; 
Sons of immortal sires, 

To arms ! to arms ! 



Unfurl your banner bright, 

Freedom's writ in every fold; 
Fling wide its starry light ! 
Freemen, behold ! 



84- The Call to Battle— The Battle of Life 

Loud hear Columbia cry, 

" Ye of craven blood, begone ! 
Forward, to win or die. 

My braves ! March on ! 

" Protect Earth's dearest charms ; 

Tyrants ! traitors ! lay them low. 
Shout ! shout the call to arms ! 
Down with the foe ! " 

Tramp ! tramp ye comrades bold ; 

Sweet shall be the cannon's roar. 
Sweeter the vict'ry told — 
The battle o'er! 

Echo, o'er hill and plain, 

Far-resounding bugle-cries ! 
Will ye the call disdain? 
Awake! arise! 




WO O 



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